gene x environment – ASF Weekly Science Podcasts

This week we talk to Dr. Dan Geschwind from UCLA who was funded by the Autism Data Science Initiative to study thousands of environmental chemicals and medicines across various genetic backgrounds. A decade ago, this study would have taken a decade, but through new technology, robotics, and existing knowledge about genes and these chemicals, it … Continue reading "The newest most advanced wa...

Traditionally, scientists have been able to calculate the role of genes in autism, or the environment in autism. However, understanding the role of genes together with the environment, or the effects of the environment with a genetic background, has been very difficult. This is especially true with polygenic genetic risk factors, which is not a … Continue reading "Calculating a gene x enviro...

The National Institutes of Health just awarded $50million to 13 different research sites to better understand genetic and environmental contributions to an autism diagnosis, or increase in prevalence in autism, as well as environmental factors which improve the quality of life for children and adults with ASD. You can read about them here or listen … Continue reading "Have you heard the good...

This week the @WSJ reported that the upcoming MAHA report will include acetaminophen (also known as Tylenol in the United States, although it is used all over the world) use during pregnancy as a cause of autism. Acetaminophen is used in about 7.5 % of pregnant women. This is one of many environmental exposures that … Continue reading "Let’s Talk Tylenol"

New research points to a previously understudied but fascinating mechanism by which environmental factors may lead to autism: it’s called the “GABA/glutamate switch” which is a critical period in development when certain cells turn from turning on cell activity to turning them off. These environmental factors may delay this process leading to long term effects … Continue re...

In recognition of Father’s Day on the 16th, today’s podcast includes the latest research on fathers. Fathers may often be the “secondary caregiver” but should hardly be dismissed as inconsequential. Father’s sensitivity and insightfulness plays an important part in development, psychiatric diagnoses (including autism) change the the chance of having a child with autis...

Everyone knows that every person with autism has their own unique strengths and challenges. Autism is heritable, and there are over 100 genes associated with autism. There are also an unknown number of environmental factors influencing outcome, so the heterogeneity is not necessarily surprising. But why would two people with the same genetic mutation have … Continue reading "Resilience and h...

The media has just called another biological marker a “diagnostic test”, when in this case, it was always intended to be an aid, not a test itself. It involves using baby hair strands to look a variation in metabolism of certain chemical elements across time. Remarkably, it showed similar results in autistic children in Japan, … Continue reading "A potential biomarker to AID, not...

You heard it in the news this week, and we discuss it on this week’s ASF podcast. Can you make little brains in a dish then make them better by providing them a real structured live neural environment? Can these organoids integrate with a live brain and be functional in vivo? The answers are: yes! … Continue reading "Genetic confounding plus organoids"

You have maybe heard about how environmental exposures after conception or birth may affect genetic expression and then risk of developing autism. But what research has been done to look at preconceptional exposures, presumably exposures that affect the cells that then give rise to sperm and eggs? Turns out they are susceptible to some environmental … Continue reading "A new ways for the env...

Is it genes or is it the environment? or is it a combination? This question has plagued researchers and scientists and caused a lot of confusion in families about what caused their own or their child’s ASD. This week we review the mechanisms by which de-novo mutations could be the work of gene x environment … Continue reading "What causes autism? Genetics or the Environment? Or maybe b...

Welcome to 2021! Over the holiday break, autism researchers were busy coming up with answers to important questions: 1) how does an environmental exposure relevant to ASD change gene expression and 2) does Telehealth work and for whom? The first question was addressed by an ASF undergraduate who published in Nature. He is going to … Continue reading "Happy New Year – reasons to be exci...